To China, with love

As someone who is convinced that Indian Communists serve as a Chinese fifth column in our beloved Bharat Mata, I look for every chance to expose their treasonous behaviour.

As someone who is convinced that Indian Communists serve as a Chinese fifth column in our beloved Bharat Mata, I look for every chance to expose their treasonous behaviour. Generally, it8217;s hard to catch our comrades red-handed. Unlike the common or garden variety of Indian politician, Communists tend to be clever creatures full of obfuscation, ideological mumbo-jumbo and deception. When they speak for China, they do so in a way that makes your average newspaper reader think they are speaking in India8217;s national interest. But last week Commissar Karat8217;s Chinese knickers were on full display.

Speaking in Kolkata at probably the only event left in the world that continues to celebrate the 90th anniversary of the Soviet revolution, the Commissar had this to say:

8220;We shall not rest in our fight till strategic ties with the US are snapped 8230; India is a prize for the US and not Pakistan because of its market. Developed India can be useful for counter-balancing China. This is a game the US is trying to play which has to be foiled.8221;

Comrade Karat said the US was trying to contain China because, by the middle of this century, the Chinese economy would equal that of the US and this would make it 8220;the most powerful socialist country capable of challenging the might of the US.8221;

We know that our Marxists hate the US and in equal and opposite measure love China as the sole surviving Marxist superpower. So to me what was most interesting about Commissar Karat8217;s statement was that reference to a 8220;developed8221; India being used to balance China.

What did he mean? Is he suggesting that India curb its attempts to become a developed country because a rich, powerful India might harm China8217;s economic interests? If he is suggesting that, then much of what the Marxists have been up to in the past three years becomes as clear as clear can be.

They have used their power over this government to stop all the things that would have benefited India. China8217;s economic reforms, which began in the early 1980s under Deng Xiao Ping, became a model that we in India tried to follow. The Marxists know this well and often do in West Bengal what they oppose at the Centre. But so abject has Dr Manmohan Singh8217;s government been in its submission to Marxist will that there was not a murmur of protest till the nuclear deal.

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Tragic, if you consider what could have happened under a prime minister who is credited with having started the process of reforming India8217;s economy. Even more tragic, if you consider that he works with a finance minister who is a dedicated reformer. In a recent lecture Finance Minister P. Chidambaram said, 8220;For three decades after Independence, India adopted a dirigiste model of economic development. In those years, India8217;s GDP grew at an average rate of 3.5 per cent. I call those years the lost decades.8221;

It is the policies of those lost decades that the Marxists would have us return to. To this end they have forced the government to abandon all attempts at economic reform. With privatisation and labour reform, they have ideological problems, but interestingly they have done nothing to improve public education and healthcare. Surely it is 8220;anti-people8221; to continue to have public healthcare and schools of such appalling quality?

They have done nothing either to force the government8217;s pace on the building of infrastructure, so thousands of major projects languish in suspended animation raising costs to taxpayers by the minute. I have always wondered why the Communists never tried to help in matters that directly benefit ordinary Indians. But now the Commissar has given us the answer. It is not in China8217;s interests for India to become a developed country because it would then be used by the US as a counter to China. To put it even more clearly, it is in the interests of Indian Communists that India remains poor, debased and decrepit forever because then India does not matter.

Well, here is what I think. We must increase our strategic, commercial and nuclear ties with the US to foil this game of Chinese checkers in which we do not even know the rules. It is a shame the prime minister did not have the courage to call the Marxists8217; bluff on the nuclear deal, but it8217;s not too late. Let him stand up to them even now. If they force an early election, there is every indication that Congress will benefit and they will end up in history8217;s dustbin. What a pleasant thought that is, because it is in that dustbin they belong.